This past Sunday, I went to a very sad, but also uplifting, event. This was a memorial celebration of the life of Shelley Rideout, who was killed Jan. 12 at the intersection of Channing Way and Fulton Street by a car driven by a City of Berkeley employee.
About 80 people gathered in the auditorium of Berkeley’s Veterans Memorial Building.
I knew Shelley for several years through the Berkeley Historical Society. She volunteered at BHS as a docent, exhibit curator, and regular in the archives where she carefully accessioned and evaluated materials. Bill Roberts, the BHS archivist, said at the gathering that she seemed to know the what and where of everything in the extensive and eclectic collections.
She patiently answered research questions on many topics and she reached out with material she thought could be of use to others. A number of times, Shelley would pause at the History Center or email to tell me about something new she had found related to one of my research interests.
Shelley was co-author of Bohemian Berkeley, which chronicled early Berkeley’s cultural and artistic experimenters. She worked as a seamstress and costume designers for several West Coast performing arts organizations, and as a buyer and textile expert at Samuel Schemer Linens in San Francisco. She was the past board president of the Western Branch of the Costume Society of America.
The audience was sprinkled with nattily dressed women and men who looked like they just stepped out of the 1930s, friends of Shelley from the Art Deco Society of California. It was there that she had made her mark helping to craft period costumes and well as researching and writing.
Cherie Oliver told a story about how she had wanted to go to a special dance, but didn’t have a period dress for it. It turned out Shelley not only had the right ball gown, but was willing to fit it for her in the middle of the night so she could go to the ball. “She wasn’t flashy, she was just excellent,” Oliver concluded.
Others came forward, friends, neighbors, co-workers and fellow volunteers. Some had met Shelley only recently; others described half-century old friendships, going back to the days when Shelley was an eager young fashion designer in San Francisco.
Fred Dal Broi described something few had known. For more than a decade, Shelley had worked quietly advising on fabric and decorative restorations and replacements at not only Hearst Castle at San Simeon, but the still private Wyntoon Hearst estate (designed by Julia Morgan) in Northern California.
There was music by Devi Vaani and invocation and benediction delivered by Paula Gerhardt. Her exhibit co-worker, Country Joe McDonald, sang as his personal tribute.
Shelley’s calm, friendly, helpful ways and kindnesses were consistently remembered during the gathering. Longtime friend Eloise Norris said of Shelley, “her opinions always included the other point of view. She was inclusive. She wasn’t judgmental. She didn’t devote all her energies to one career course … if something excited her, she tried it.”
“Thank you all for showing the beautiful, full, picture of Shelley, the multi-faceted picture,” said past BHS president Linda Rosen, who led the event.
“We never know when they’re going to leave us, so the lesson is to appreciate them while they’re here,” said Ed Herny, one of Shelley’s collaborators on books and exhibits.
If you want to see remarkable that something Shelley helped shape, go to the Berkeley Historical Society March 24 or March 25 from 1 to 4 p.m. to view the exhibit “Soundtrack to the Sixties.” It closes at the end of the day on March 25.